The fundamental goal of the Spore Initiative is to promote dialogue between figures in politics, society, and the arts, with the aim of harmonizing culture and nature, and supporting projects that encourage ecological change. For this purpose, the client, the Schöpflin Foundation from Lörrach, announced an ideas competition, from which AFF Gesellschaft für Architekten mbH from Berlin emerged as the winner in 2018. With their sculptural, yet timeless design for the building ensemble consisting of Spore Initiative and House of Non-profit Journalism, the designers have established an approach that respectfully references its surroundings in terms of materiality and scale. The use of red brick masonry is not only reflected in the nearby cemetery buildings, but also in other public buildings in Berlin.
The Spore Initiative property is located on the busy Hermannstrasse in Berlin’s Neukölln district, to the right of the historic entrance to the Protestant cemetery Jerusalem V, which is to be gradually sold and rededicated over the coming decades. Situated in the immediate vicinity of the former Tempelhof Airport and in its old flight path, the architects of the Berlin-based AFF office have integrated not only the cemetery portal but also two landmarked aircraft approach masts into the architectural ensemble in order to achieve communication between the buildings and their existing surroundings. The new edifice with its flowing forms and the extraordinary interplay of different types of brick opens up to the public with an inviting, glazed first floor and a large roof terrace extending across the corner. The interior is characterized primarily by concrete elements and a striking coffered concrete ceiling.
On the first floor, which serves as a movement landscape for all public functions, there is a lobby, cafeteria, project room and an auditorium, on the 1st floor there are exhibition spaces, above them a library, seminar rooms, apartments for artists and authors, studios and offices. The basement houses the necessary auxiliary spaces. The roof terrace, which can also be reached via an external staircase, has limited public access and offers employees and visitors an attractive space for exchange and encounters.
The visitor enters the flowing rooms of the approximately 4-meter-high first floor via the newly designed forecourt on Hermannstrasse. A special feature is that the materiality of the exterior is continued in color into the gray exposed screed of the interior, thus achieving a close relationship between exterior and interior. The foyer area, which is flooded with daylight due to the generous floor-to-ceiling glazing and its raw materiality, is characterized by a striking ceiling structure of coffered concrete ceilings. The polygonal ceiling coffers form a cell-like structure and extend between the joists as a profiled slab with integrated wood-concrete acoustic strips. The lighting concept cleverly picks up on the graphic design language by integrating linear lighting elements into the ribs in a dissolved arrangement. With a wide-beam characteristic and a light color of 3,000 K, they provide lively ambient lighting that invites people to explore and linger. The lighting atmosphere supports the natural character of the building through subtle gradations in uniformity with appropriately distributed brightness levels. In addition, the primarily light-colored materials of the interior design and freely arranged furniture are emphasized, while the light reflecting off the surfaces gently illuminates and highlights the ceiling structure.
